OCTOBER 1, 2001: OPPORTUNITY FOR REFLECTION, NOT FOR MERRIMENT. 

By

Professor Omo Omoruyi, mni,

Research Fellow, African Studies Center, Boston University

Further to the advice of the President of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Aremu Matthew Obasanjo I hope Nigerians at home and abroad would during this period of the celebration of ‘Independence Day’ leave aside their various political differences and their pasts and reflect on the meaning of this day, October 1, of any year since 1960. This is what I shall be doing in this two-part essay. In this first part, I shall focus on what I knew as the ‘Independence Settlement’ of October 1, 1960 from the ‘Independence Election’ of December 1959.

I personally knew what happened on October 1, 1960, because I was very much an adult being a trained and certificated schoolteacher, with an experience of a voter to my credit. I participated in what I call the ‘Independence Election’ of December 1959. I hope many Nigerians who played different roles before and during the period of the event of October 1, 1960 would reflect on the event itself, the journey so far, the present and the future and their relationship.

Was the current Nigeria what we voted for in 1959? Could we imagine that the Nigeria of today was what the voter of 1959 prayed for? This is my way of approaching this first part of this essay.

FROM MY REFLECTION

After reflection, I came to the conclusion that Nigeria of today was not what I voted for in 1959 or what the successor to the founders of Nigeria bargained for. I would want to make this distinction between the founding fathers of Nigeria who were three, Lord Harcourt, Lord Lugard and Sir James Robertson and not the so-called Nigerian politicians. Chief Obafemi Awolowo was very clear of this that Britain created or founded Nigeria and the nationalists such as Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe or Chief Obafemi Awolowo or Sardauna of Sokoto were merely successors to what Britain created or founded between 1914 and 1960. I once dismissed President Obasanjo’s thesis that God created or founded Nigeria and that God in His Infinite Mercy must have had something in mind when ‘Amalgamation’ was contemplated and probably when the ‘Independence Settlement’ was arrived at. With all the injustices in the land, God had no hand in the plan and in the implementation of the plan.

Since Nigerians did not create or found Nigeria, the question is what did the founder, the British have in mind when its officials took many actions they took beginning with the ‘Amalgamation of 1914 and culminating in the ‘Independence Settlement’ of 1960? There is a relationship between the past, the present and the future. If the past in its relationship with the present has anything to teach us, it is that the relationship between the present and the future of Nigeria is bleak. These relationships are sometimes glossed over. If 1914 was ‘a fraud’ courtesy to Chief Richard Akinjide, then October 1 1960 should have been made to correct the fraud by the colonial ruler and the Nigerian political leaders; it was not so done. October 1, 1960 compounded and complicated the fraud of 1914.

Other settlements concerned how the minority groups in the north and in the south were denied homes or regions or states of their own in Nigeria as part of the ‘Independence Settlement’. At independence they were left in the three regions inhabited and dominated by the three ethnic nationalities in the north, west and east despite their claim that they were victims of many human rights violations, which made them to agitate for their regions before independence.

October 1, 1960 was a huge fraud, because it left the country and its leaders, military and civilians with the two nagging problems unresolved and still lingering today. I am referring to how Nigerians from all ethnic nationalities can live together; and how Nigeria should be governed, which formed the basis of my contribution to the Vanguard October 1, 2001 edition of the Vanguard.

THE ‘MISTAKE OF OCTOBER 1960’ FROM ‘INDEPENDENCE ELECTION’ OF 1959

I knew what happened on October 1, 1960; I voted a year earlier. From what I knew from the data on the election from the data supplied in the book by Ken Post (The Nigerian Federal Elections of 1959), that election was inconclusive, as it did not produce a winner. The system of election was at variance with the nature of the Nigerian plural set up and the political class failed in their primary duties of ensuring that each ethnic nationality was adequately represented.

If the principle of Proportional Representation (PR) were adopted, the National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) would have secured majority of seats in the House of Representatives. The Governor General would not have had a choice but to invite the leader of the NCNC, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe to form the government. Dr. Azikiwe would have been the first Prime Minister of an independent Nigeria under the PR system in his won right, which he rightly deserved and the history of Nigeria would have been different. One could ask some pertinent questions.

Why did the political leaders not make a case for PR as a condition for participation in the Independence Election?

Did Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo not foresee what was to befall them in 1959 under the unrepresentative system of election called the First-Past-the-Post?

Why did they settle for the Westminster model, which is antithetical to the nature of plural society?

The system of election was a big mistake then and it appears one of those who pushed their party to adopt this system, is advocating it today as part of his pact with the PDP. I am referring to Chief Anthony Enahoro who is advocating for a return to the Parliamentary System the system he knew as a politician. Why did he make it one of his deals with the PDP? He ought to have known that there is no way Nigeria would ever return to that system, which failed and relegated the minority groups to the background in the past, whatever his understanding with the PDP. It was this ignorance, which led the successors to the colonial order to agree to the Parliamentary System. This is evident in the argument of Chief Enahoro. With the greatest respect to Chief Enahoro, what he is advocating will diminish the power of the minorities in the country. I hate to believe this is not his plan.

The problem with Nigeria is not in the Presidential System; the problem is that what General Murtala Muhammed wanted for himself with Sharia to the bargain was not understood by the first person (Alhaji Shehu Shagari) that became the elected President in 1979. The record is there, he did not believe in the Presidential System and worked against it in the Constituent Assembly in 1977/78. It was an irony that those who worked against the Presidential System became the operators of the system in 1979 and those that worked for it never found themselves to the position to operate it.

Here we are with another elected President (Obasanjo) who through no fault of his own and with little or no faith in politics and politicians from his past finds himself running the system alone. One would ask whither the National Assembly and the political parties and the non-governmental organizations?

Maybe because the National Assembly is still in search of a role for itself, this was why the gifted parliamentarian as Chief Awolowo aptly described Chief Anthony Enahoro wants a return to the parliament of old. The power of the Parliament under the Westminster Model even in the United Kingdom is on the decline, whereas parliament under the Presidential System like in the US could be powerful if the members know their power. The legislatures at all levels in Nigeria since 1999 are made up of persons in search of roles for themselves and for the institution of legislature.

There is still an unexplained part of our political history, which I would discuss in my forthcoming book on the political dynamics in the Constituent Assembly. I am referring to the genesis of the Presidential System in the Constituent Assembly in 1977/78.

THE ‘INDEPENDENCE SETTLEMENT’ OF 1960: A CASE OF TWO v ONE

The ‘Independence Settlement’ produced a case of two against one. What I mean by this would be obvious. It was unwittingly planned and implemented by the North and the East to destroy the West and its leaders.

By the condition of the settlement, Alhaji Abubakar Tafawa Balewa of the Northern Peoples Congress (NPC) with no member outside the north was made the first Prime Minister of an independent Nigeria. Dr. Azikiwe with a national coverage with the largest supporters in the country north and south resigned his seat in the House of Representatives and was made the President of the rubber stamp Senate. He later became the first Ceremonial Governor General on his birthday on November 16 1960. That was the ‘Independence Settlement’.

In the end he knew he was tricked and he never forgave himself for accepting this role as he rightly lamented in December 1978, ‘I never ruled this country even for one day’. Many of us who heard the Owelle of Onitsha and a Presidential aspirant on the platform of the Nigerian Peoples party wondered what he meant. It was later that I knew that he was reacting to how the north tricked him in the past.

One should also recall that Chief Obafemi Awolowo one of the three political leaders who could lay claim to the leadership of an independent Nigeria also like Dr. Azikiwe with representatives throughout the country was excluded from the ‘Independence Settlement’. This is what I mean when I call the ‘Independence Settlement’, ‘two against one’. The ‘Independence Settlement’ for Nigeria provided for only two of its three pillars, Dr. Azikiwe of the east and Sir Abubakar/Sir Ahmadu of the north. It was noted above that October 1, 1960 did not provide for the minorities in the north and in the south.

Thus the ‘Independence Settlement’ was the beginning of the ‘politics of inclusion and exclusion’ culminating in the ‘Mistake of 1960’. Is this not still continuing today?

I was amazed with the revelations in the memoir of the last British Governor General, Sir James Robertson (Transition in Africa, 1974). Sir James opined that the Sardauna threatened to take his ‘North’ away, if the two southern leaders were allowed to form a government, even though the two leaders had representatives throughout the country including the north. From the results of the Federal election of 1959, the NCNC had the northern members through the NEPU and the Action Group had members in the through the UMBC. Which ‘north’ would the Sardauna have taken away?

Who told Sir James that the three political parties (NPC, NCNC and AG) could not work together as a transitional measure within the first four years after independence? They could have formed Government of National Unity to take the country to independence and beyond. This was where the three political leaders made mistakes.

Another mistake was how the two political parties (NPC and NCNC) engineered the crisis in the west in 1962 with the sole purpose of destroying the AG and its leadership for their narrow selfish interest. This criminal act engineered both by the two political parties against the Western Region and the Action Group led to the series of events as Chief Anthony Enahoro rightly foretold on the floor of the House of Representatives in May 1962, the end we did not know. We had since known that, that act culminated in the first coup and in the series of events the end no one knew up till today. Could this have been averted or avoided? This could have been averted.

I hope the former military Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon would revisit the period before and after independence and stop distorting the history of Nigeria. I was shocked when he stated recently that the cause of the lingering political problems in Nigeria as the first coup. There was no evidence in his assertion that could identify these lingering political problems. Maybe he did not even understand them. Haba! General give us a break! The lingering political problems started with the fraud in the ‘Amalgamation’ of January 1, 1914 and in the ‘Independence Settlement’ of October 1, 1960. Period!

As if the above distortion was not bad enough, General Gowon went before an august Conference of the Civil War at Ibadan to make false claim that he meant to hand over to civilian government in 1976. This is dastardly falsehood, as the records of his aides did not bear this out. I shall deal with this in my forthcoming book on the plan of his aides to make General Gowon transform himself into something, which he did not even understand.

It was unfair for the General to castigate Chief Awolowo when he told his audience that the cause of the coup that threw him out of office in 1975 was because Chief Obafemi Awolowo left his government after the Civil War to commence his political ambition. How could he attribute the management of the economy to one man? Where were the Shagaris and others working with him when Chief Awolowo left on the belief that General Gowon was serious and honest with Nigerians with his plan to return Nigeria to civilian rule in 1976? It was a display of faith in the plan of General Gowon and on General Gowon himself if a renowned Chief like Chief Awolowo should go to the Nigeria people to tell them that General Gowon meant what he told Nigerians. It was still one of the mistakes of Chief Awolowo to have believed General Gowon that he meant to return power to the civilian in 1976.

General Gowon should read the account of his officers during this period such Generals JJ. Oluleye, Segun Obasanjo, Joe Garba and Jemibewon and respond to them in a reasoned memoir instead of this unsubstantiated assertions attributed to him since he returned to Nigeria.

Another error in the historical account of the ‘Independence Settlement’ of October 1, 1960 has to do with how Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe became the ceremonial Governor General and later the ceremonial President. We are told that Dr. Azikiwe became the ceremonial Governor General as a result of the alliance between the northern led political party (Northern Peoples Congress-NPC) and the eastern led political party (National Council of Nigerian Citizens-NCNC). The records in the British Colonial Office, which were ably reflected on by the last British Colonial Governor General, Sir James Robertson in his memoir ought to have informed our scholars and politicians that Dr. Azikiwe was not made Governor General from the goodwill of the northern political leaders. We should correct our records.

But for the British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, Sir Abubakar had reached another deal with the outgoing executive Governor General Sir James Robertson to ditch Dr. Azikiwe after using him to divide the southern front and make Sir James extend his tenure as the first Ceremonial Governor General of Nigeria after independence. You can see this account of the northern intrigue in the memoir of Sir James Robertson written in 1974 called the Transition in Africa.

For the interest of those who are concerned about the genesis of the Nigerian political problems, let me state what is not usually discussed, which I already refer to as the ‘Mistake of 1960". If this is what we are celebrating, we should make some efforts or use the occasion to call on the President to address this mistake.

It is unfortunate that Nigerians are made to recite the ‘Mistake of 1914’ and ignore the ‘Mistake of 1960’. One would recall that the ‘Mistake of 1914’ was voiced twice in the nation’s history and no one knows of or talks about the ‘Mistake of 1960’.

MISTAKE OF 1999

We are beginning to read of the ‘Mistake of 1999’ in some northern circles. They are ashamed to remind the country of the ‘Mistake of 1914’ because they thought they had overcome that, and had successfully turned the ‘Mistake of 1914’ into the ‘Blessing of 1914’ and the ‘Blessing of 1960’.

General Babangida made the north to swallow the bitter pills and commit the "Mistake of 1999’ on the erroneous assumption that the northern interest would be best served if the north should support a candidate made by the north through him. Under this arrangement, the new President from the south would be beholden to the north during his administration. General Babangida thought that the north should try that candidate with just one term in the first instance with a condition for a second term being dependent on how he fared as a ‘Good Boy’.

Why did the plan, which produced President Obasanjo turn out to be a mistake? It was not a mistake but it was General Babangida who misled the northern political leaders that the quality they dreaded in Chief MKO Abiola would NOT be present in the man he was recommending. This was arrant nonsense for General Babangida to think or give the impression to the northern leaders that Chief Olusegun Obasanjo was not a true son of his father.

This was the ‘Mistake of 1999’ for making General Abdulsalami Abubakar to go for General Olusegun Obasanjo after the death of General Sani Abacha in 1998.

Part (2) OF THIS REFLECTION IS FORTHCOMING.

October, 2001

In the PART 1 of this essay on ‘OCTOBER 1, 2001: OPPORTUNITY FOR REFLECTION', I made reference to the ‘Mistake of 1960’ and I dwelt on why I chose to call it that way. I identified two nagging problems plaguing this country, which are: 

(a) how to live together among Nigeria's various groups and  

(b) how to govern Nigeria.

In this part i.e. PART 11, I shall be relating it to the earlier mistake in the political history of Nigeria, which is called the ‘Mistake of 1914. This is also discussed within the two problems identified in Part 1. It will focus on how to set about tackling them.

For those who might not have had the privilege to read about the genesis of the concept of ‘Mistake of 1914’, let me go back to the history of the concept and how it was used three times in the history of Nigeria, 1953, 1966 and 1993.

1953: I recall the first time the term the ‘Mistake of 1914’ was used by the northern political leader, Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto in 1953 over the ‘self-government’ Motion by young Tony Enahoro in March 1953. What the Sardauna was alluding to was that the ‘amalgamation of January 1, 1914 was a mistake’, as the idea of a southerner running the show, was inconsistent with what Britain told the northern political leaders when amalgamation was planned and executed on January 1, 1914.

1966: This ‘Mistake of 1914’ was repeated by the surviving northern political leaders in 1966 following the January military coup. That was when the northern leaders for the second time in the history of Nigeria were faced the prospect of losing the northern leadership, which they thought would be inconsistent with the British Design in Nigeria.

1993: A third occasion was in 1993 when the prospect of a southerner actually becoming a President of Nigeria in spite of the north was imminent. Of course we knew what happened! The combined force of the civilian and military elements of the northern leadership fought it and succeeded in annulling the election.

It should be the turn of the south to call the January 1, 1914 not only a mistake but also join Chief Richard Akinjide to call it a ‘fraud’. The south should contest the claims of the north who are arguing that there is a ‘Mistake of 1914’ and take October 1, 1960 as the ‘Mistake of 1960’.

For the interest of those who are being introduced to this concept of 1914 for the first time, it should be noted that under the British Design, the south was supposed to be the ‘lady of means’ (WIFE) and the north was supposed to be the ‘young man’ (HUSBAND). Amalgamation was then conceived as a process of bringing about the union or marriage of the ‘young northerner’ and the ‘rich madam from the south’. This was the British plan in 1913 before the implementer, Sir Frederick D. Lugard, a former employee of the Royal Niger Company, who put together the north in the 19^th century was named as the Governor General of the two Nigerias; North united and South in pieces or atomized states.

Lord Harcourt, the British Colonial Secretary then issued the wedding license to Sir Frederick Lugard to preside over the wedding. This was what is referred to as the ‘Mistake of 1914’, which the northern leaders wanted dissolved on two occasions in Nigerian history, 1953 and 1966.

The relationship between ‘one north’ and ‘many souths’ was supposed to be governed by the rule of conjugal power structure, which is static and unalterable or irreversible, as we know it in Nigeria. This was what 1914 was supposed to be; a permanent state of affair where the north would be the husband and the south would continue to be the wives. Then arises the question for democracy planners for a society with this mind set. Do you use election to reverse the conjugal power structure? I was confronted with this reality in 1993 and it was so demonstrated in my book on the annulment of the June 12. For the interest of Nigerians who are fighting to reverse the dominant and monopolistic claim of the north over political power as the 'husband' of the 'south' to consider certain facts.

It was the conjugal power structure that Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo did not understand but which they fought to reverse before independence and failed.

This was what their lieutenants (Okpara/Adegbenro) tried to change in 1964 under the United Progressive Grand Alliance (UPGA) and failed woefully.

This was what was Major Kaduna Nzeogwu attempted to violently reverse in 1966 January.

This was what was violently reenacted through the second coup in July 1966.

This was what the Biafran could no longer live with and wanted to secede in 1967;

This was why the Civil War was fought to reenact between 1967 and 1970.

It was this conjugal power structure, which was so obvious in the Constituent Assembly was to be changed in the Constituent Assembly with the cooperation of the Middle-Belt caucus. But that plan to reverse it was frustrated by the Supreme Military Council dominant by the 'husband'.

This was what Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo after many years and in their old age in 1979 and in 1983 tried to reverse and miserably failed.

It is a matter of record that when they failed they out of frustration or disillusionment cursed Nigeria that my generation would not live to see democracy.

One would still recall that in one of the Independence Lectures, Professor Tekena Tamuno had to plead with the military to beg the old men to forgive us our sins.

It is a matter of record that this was what Chief MKO Abiola set out to achieve between 1979 and 1983 and he was frustrated by the National Party of Nigeria and forced out of the party later.

It is a matter of record and I can vouch for it that this was the feat he achieved in June 1993. Of course, we knew how it all ended.

It is a matter of record that General Babangida paved way for General Sani Abacha.

It is a matter of record that he connived at General Abacha's self-succession project as a solution to the issues in the annulment.

We are witnesses to how the duo of political generals, Babangida and Abubakar are refusing to go before the Oputa Commission to tell their countrymen how Chief Abiola’s mandate was denied him leading to his detention unto death in Abacha/Abubakar’s Gulag in July 1998.

 

As I said in my book on the annulment of June 12, the conjugal power structure was what the election of June 12, 1993 would have changed through the interplay of democratic forces forever.

That was what the northern political/military leaders feared, if Dr. Alex Ekwueme or Chief Olu Falae was allowed to succeed the junta in 1999.

This was where General Babangida and his cohorts in political crime thought they were being smart; they saw Chief Obasanjo as one they could trust with safeguarding the rampart being guarded by the junta. Of course, they wanted him to do this as his primary assignment and neglect Nigeria he would be sworn to defend and protect.

Did the political generals who are running away from apologizing to the Nigerian people through the Oputa Commission have to detain Chief MKO unto death in order to achieve their objective? They were playing God; God aborted their self-succession project, which these political generals supported as a solution to June 12. Yes it did not unfortunately provide for death for General Abacha. But it provided for death for Chief Abiola from the time of General Babangida, if Chief Abiola stuck to his claim to his mandate. The petitioners who went to the Oputa Commission to raise question as to the death of Chief Abiola should have refocused their argument before the Oputa Commission. Their petition should have dealt with the genesis of Chief Abiola’s problem, the annulment in June 23, 1993. General Babangida should have used the opportunity of the Commission to name the 1001 men he claimed were involved in the annulment saga that he said he was protecting from harm. They do not need his protection, as they would have liked to use the opportunity of Oputa to bare their mind.

The Oputa Commission should find out whether they had to kill Chief Abiola in order to balance the equation since the death of their idol and candidate, General Abacha, which was not provided for in their original plan.

No matter what General Babangida says today or whether he appears before the Oputa Commission or whether he refuses to apologize to his countrymen, Nigerians already had since he went to court made up their mind. Does he not know that Nigerians believe that he cannot escape complicity in the events that led to the death of Chief Abiola and the catalogue of human rights violations under his REAL successor, General Sani Abacha?

Also, no matter what General Abubakar says today, does it not occur to him that he through acts of omission or commission or indiscretion inherited the Abacha’s Gulag? Nigerians believed that General Abubakar did not only make the Gulag his own, he allowed Chief Abiola to be murdered, because he did not want through acts of omission or commission or indiscretion allow Chief Abiola to alter the British Design in Nigeria. Simple!

The northern political leaders short of crying of the ‘Mistake of 1914’ are now calling the IBB masterminded transition including the experiment under General Abubakar as the ‘Mistake of 1999’. How many times will the northern political leaders continue to call different dates a mistake?

The northern political leaders have since 1999 realized

That President Obasanjo has a mind of his own; and

That Chief Matthew Aremu Olusegun Obasanjo is the true son of his father.

This was the origin of the ‘political Sharia’ as President Obasanjo calls it. The political Sharia was conceived in 1999 in Zamfara and spread like a wild fire in the north.

WE ARE TODAY SEEING THE AFGHANISTAN ISSUE AS AN ANTI-IGBO-YORUBA AND ANTI-CHRISTIAN VIOLENCE IN KANO! OSAMA bin LADI photograph is all over the north as the savior of the north and most seriously:

As an agenda of liberation from the south; and

As a platform for rallying the troops, the faithful for destabilizing the government of Obasanjo.

When the political Sharia failed, the same forces of destabilization masterminded by the former Head of State, General Buhari is campaigning over the Muslim north, that they should vote for their kind or for those who would protect the Islamic religion in future elections. Another group of destabilization is also at work and wants General Babangida to be a candidate of a non-existent political party or a political association of the north and challenge President Obasanjo in 2003.

The northern political leaders should look back to how many years they ruled Nigerian and how their misrule contributed to the ARMY OF BEGGARS in the north. They now constitute what Alhaji Yusuf Maitama Sule and Alhaji Atiku Abubakar rightly warned as constituting a security threat to Nigeria. See The Guardian September 24, 2001 account of the fear expressed by these two distinguished Muslim leaders (Damasani Kano and the Vice President respectively) during the launching of the book, Almajiri and Quaranic Education put together by the Council for Welfare of the Disabled.

ANTI-US, A PLOY FOR NEW AREWA AGENDA OF ANTI-OBASANJO AND REVERSE THE 'MISTAKE OF 1999'

Of course, President Obasanjo saw what harm these beggars could be put by the northern political leaders. President Obasanjo was right when he said that the young kids who ought to have been in schools knew nothing about the Afghanistan and Osama and the US. Of course their leaders knew what use they could make of the situation.

What has anti-US demonstration got to do with anti-Nigerians of other faith and of other ethnic group in Kano? Are they really beggars? Were these not the people mobilized after the Jumat prayer on Friday to fight for the reenactment of the Islamic Republic of Buhari's dream in Nigeria?

These are the army armed by the Muslim Northern Governors to defend the 'faithful' against the infidels, which include the President, a Christian complained about the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN)? For the appeal of CAN on the 100 million naira arms imported by the Northern Governors for the defense of their faith credited to the Zamfara Governor, Alhaji Ahmed Sani, see the Vanguard of October 13, 2001.

It should be obvious to the President and the Nigerian people and the US that these children were being armed by the northern Muslim/political leaders who are not happy with the 'Mistake of 1999' and want to reverse it. They are using these children to commit mayhem in Kano in the name of protesting against the US bombing of Afghanistan. I hope the US would draw the distinction between the act of those who want to use any excuse to destabilize the government of President Obasanjo under any guise and the act of genuine protesters and those who are supporting the terrorist. President Obasanjo spoke for Nigeria when he expressed the sympathy of the Nigerian people after the September 11 and when he later expressed his support for the US action thereafter.

I hope readers would see Boston Globe of October 17, 2001 for the account of President Obasanjo visit to these beggars, young children acting in defense of OSAMA and killing southerners in Kano. The number of those who died so far in Afghanistan and in the nearby Pakistan are less than the number killed by the Muslim beggars in Kano.

These are the same Muslim voters to be mobilized to work for the election of IBB and against Obasanjo-Atiku ticket in the name what General Buhari called vote for those who would defend their religion.

The organizers of IBB for 2003 and the campaign for Muslim for 2993 are not reckoning with the fall out of the Oputa Commission. Sometime we forget that Dr. Umaru Dikko is a Muslim and a Fulani like General Buhari; on his instruction Dr. Dikko was drugged by a Jew recruited by a Christian under the auspices of a Nigerian High Commissioner who was a Christian.

This was why I pleaded with Nigerians to refocus the Oputa Commission, because of the relationship between the June 12 and the catalogue of human rights violations in Nigeria. The denial of human dignity to Dr. Dikko should not be allowed to be swept under the carpet by the act of using the normal court by General Buhari. These political generals are playing with The Hague. How I wish President Shehu Shagari would go forward to testify on the way he was treated in detention in the hand of General Buhari in 1984. I wept for the country when President Shagari narrated his ordeal to me in Yabo in Sokoto when I paid him a visit as soon as he was released from detention in 1987 or so, Was Shagari a Muslim and a Fulani like General Buhari?

President Obasanjo should openly tell his northerner friend such as the Chairman of the Arewa Consultative Forum (AFC), Alhaji MD Yusuf that it is a fact that the Obasanjo he knew and worked with when he was the military Head of State in 1976 was not the same Obasanjo of today as the elected President Commander in Chief. To compare 1976 and 1999 is like comparing an apple and an orange. This is what General Babangida and his group also failed to appreciate. Maybe President Obasanjo should tell them so!

The process under which General Obasanjo assumed the position of the military Head of State in 1976 was different from how he became the President in 1999.

It is unfortunate that the northern leaders who are boasting that they made President Obasanjo are confusing the military jacking of the transition program and the PDP with the vote of the Nigerian people on February 27, 1999. It is unfortunate that they still have not acknowledged that Nigerians voted for him and not just by northerners but also by Nigerians ‘in the north’, ‘in the east’ and ‘in the south-south’ massively and to some extent ‘in the southwest’.

They refused to appreciate the enormous international validation of President Obasanjo, which no one in the north could muster.

One of the suggestions I made to President Obasanjo in 2000 during the time when the northerners were talking of ‘we made him’ was that President Obasanjo should reclaim his base of support as NIGERIANS in the following areas in this order:

The ‘oil producing areas’,

The ‘Igboland’;

The ‘Middle-Belt’;

The ‘Far North’; and

The ‘Southwest’.

President Obasanjo should be a politician, which he is not at the moment. As a politician, he should openly court the support of these areas by meeting their needs and fears. That is the only way to debunk the claim of the so-called northern leaders who are boasting that they made him in 1999 for the purpose of defending the ramparts they had been guarding since 1960. This was my advice in 2000 through many essays published in Nigeria and in the US and through the World Wide Web. That still remains my counsel today.

President Obasanjo should change his base of support not through the Peoples' Democratic Party, but through his good works and open appeal to these various groups in the country.

On October 1, 2001, President Obasanjo should publicly reclaim this national mandate consisting of the Niger-Delta, the Southeast, the Southwest, the North and the Middle-Belt. He should contest the concept; ‘we are all northerners’, because I know from my partisan days in the Second Republic and from my days as a policy maker in charge of the transition program in short lived Third Republic that there is nothing called one north.

On October 1, 2001, President Obasanjo should have proceeded to address the two lingering political problems since amalgamation or since independence or sine annulment through a NATIONAL CONFERENCE. They are two:

One is how Nigerians are to live together;

Two is how Nigeria is to be governed.

It is sad that after over 40 years of post-independence rule in the hands of Nigerians these two issues are still with us manifesting themselves in various forms such as the politics of religion, the politics of resource control etc.

If I were an adviser to President Obasanjo, I would have urged him that from October 1, 2001, President Obasanjo should set out to correct the ‘Mistake of 1960’ in another way. As Sir James Robertson, the last British Governor General of Nigeria stated in his memoir in 1974, what he wanted Sir Abubakar to do was to form a government, which drew on the membership from all shades of political persuasions from the south. Alliance of two parties was not part of the ‘Independence Settlement’.

But the condition laid down by the pro-North politicians in the NCNC was that they were more anxious in the politics of exclusion than with the politics of inclusion. They just wanted to exclude Chief Awolowo and the AG from the Federal Government than in the formation of a National Government. This would have been what we call ‘Government of National Unity’ for the first four years of an independent Nigeria. That would have been what Joe Snovo used to break the deadlock in South Africa in the post-apartheid South Africa.

Modesty aside, let me praise myself or blow my trumpet; I developed this plan for General Babangida, the military President in June 1993 when he approached me to develop an innovation, a modality for resolving the June 12 fears in the north and among their supporters in the south. It was a modification of Arend Lijphart approach to consensus building in plural societies. This was before Joe Slovo came up with a variant of that approach in South Africa in 1994. I did not know I was working with half-baked military officers who just refused to think beyond force. Where did that lead Nigeria? Chaos and decay! Is this what General Babangida through his former Vice President wants to revisit on the Nigerian people on the firm belief that Nigerian politicians are purchasable commodities?

The way to resolve the crisis over the June 12 in June 21, 1993, would have been through the Consensual Plan, which would have met the fears of the potential annullists while guaranteeing that the vote of the Nigerian people was allowed to be their voice. This was the ‘Mistake of 1993’, which General Babangida was made to reverse with collaborators from the southern politicians who cannot escape guilt.

A post-military Government like the post-colonial government in 1959/60 or the post-apartheid government in South Africa would have required a Government to which every section of society could consider to be a part.

As a prelude to the resolution of the problem, President Obasanjo should take some fundamental steps. This was what President Obasanjo should have done in 1999 by formally inviting the three political parties to nominate Ministers in states where they were dominant. The AD would have picked at least one minister in states where they were dominant; the APP would have also done so in the states where it was dominant.

I recall my initial appreciation of the 1999 presidential election; I am on record as stating then that Nigerians did not vote for the PDP, but for Chief Obasanjo on the firm belief that he would be able to see them through the lingering political problems. I argued then that Nigerians did not vote for him because of his capacity to deliver social services or build roads. These are not the problems facing the country today; these problems are only made to assume many manifestations by the lingering political problems.

My question is whether it is late today for President Obasanjo to embark on finding lasting solution to the lingering political problems through the way he puts together a new government? IT IS NOT! This should be a post-2001 approach to the resolution of the two lingering political problems.

It should be obvious to President Obasanjo today that the President’s inability to resolve these problems that is aggravating the social problems.

Of course, the reorganization of the government along the line suggested above is one way to cope with the crisis of succession I posed as ‘After Obasanjo Who/What?

Succession in the hand of one party since independence had never worked in Nigeria. I recall the ‘succession elections’ of 1964 and 1983 organized by a party in power and how they led to monumental crisis. For the ‘succession election’ to succeed in 2003, President Obasanjo should do everything to get all parties committed to

the process leading to the election;

the use of domestic monitors and international observers on election day activities; and

the outcome of the election.

 

CONCLUSION

President Obasanjo should appreciate that what he complained about on the independence Day, which made him call on Nigerians to reflect are not new. They are manifestations of the problems Nigeria had since 1960 and which his administration could not identify since 1999. They are the twin problems:

How the various ethnic nationalities could live together in peace and harmony; and

 

How to evolve a government to which all the various ethnic nationalities are committed as guaranteeing them justice.

The uncertainty in the country today is immense; it affects the Nigerian attitude to the future and it arises from these two fundamental problems. To talk about the future, I am afraid that after over 40 years Nigerian leaders, military and civilian are unable to come to terms with these two lingering political problems. The many years of military misrule further aggravated these two problems.

Nigerians and the international community saw the emergence of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo as a welcome relief to the military mismanagement of Nigeria. For the President to throw up his hands on October 1, 2001 as if the twin problems have no solution is no solution. To want to complicate them with yet another Government Agency called Presidential Commission on Security is not a solution.

In lectures I delivered in the US after the election in 1999, I argued that there was only one function, which Obasanjo’s emergence would have served for Nigeria. It would have been a ‘bridge’ between the past and the present and that before the completion of his first term, one would have thought that he would set in motion the modality for tackling the twin political problems identified above. As a result of the past leaders (civilian and military) inability to come to terms with the twin political problems, Nigeria is faced with their manifestations, such as:

The various ethnic/religious clashes in the north and in the south;

The cry over marginalization in various parts of the country;

The quest for fundamental restructuring;

The Igbo question in Nigerian politics;

The politics of resource control;

The politics of the armed forces;

The arms trafficking;

The politicization of religion; and

The violent crimes and general insecurity in the country.

President, Sir, may I humbly call on you as the President to lead Nigerians to come up with how Nigerians can live together and how Nigerian can be governed.

The President alone cannot solve these problems. Setting up a Presidential Commission on Security is an attempt to copy the US President’s Homeland Security Department in the White House as the domestic counterpart of the National Security Agency. The US had identified the source of the problems; President Obasanjo had not accepted that the problems of Nigeria since 1960 are of the two kinds identified above. If the President accepts this, then the solution is a round table conference with the two subjects on the agenda.

Yesterday it was the use of the traditional rulers; this has never been a solution as many of them have been part of the problems since 1960. They unwittingly make themselves loyal to Any Government In Power. (AGIP)

The National Assembly cannot deal with them because the election under which the National Assembly was constituted was constituted before a military-dictated Constitution was forced on it.

Nigerians should not proceed to the 2003 election with out resolving these two problems. We knew what happened in 1964 and in 1983 when one party embarked upon succession, where these two issues were in search of solution. They are still in search of solution today. October 1, 2001 is an opportunity to reflect on them; the 2003 should not be approached without resolving these two issues. This will be Obasanjo’s legacy or something else.

Enough of the Game; Enough of Drifting; Enough of Fire fighting since 1999! A Stitch in Time Saves Nine. This is the way I see the past, today and the future. This ends my reflection of the Independence Anniversary of October 1, 2001.